Mexico beauty queen caught in anti-drug raid

MEXICO CITY (Reuters) - A Mexican beauty queen and international pageant winner has been detained by police along with suspected drug traffickers who had assault rifles and cash.

Laura Zuniga, the 23-year-old Miss Sinaloa from the marijuana-producing Mexican state, was held with seven men at a military checkpoint in Guadalajara, police said on Tuesday.

"She is the beauty queen of Sinaloa and was aboard an SUV with the weapons and several of the men," said a police spokesman from western Jalisco state, home to Guadalajara.

The spokesman said police and soldiers at the checkpoint on the outskirts of Mexico's second-biggest city were tipped off that traffickers were moving through the area Monday night.

"No one expected this young woman to be aboard, along with more than a dozen cell phones, lots of cash, pistols, bullets and two rifles," the spokesman said.

Zuniga won the Miss Sinaloa title in July and was to compete in the Miss International 2009 pageant next year in Asia. She was named "Queen of Hispanic America 2008" in a contest in Bolivia.

The model is the latest well-known figure to be linked to drug traffickers this year in Mexico, where President Felipe Calderon is battling powerful cartels with soldiers and federal police.

Top anti-drug security chiefs have been accused of passing vital intelligence to kingpins and police arrested seven soccer players and club directors at second division Mapaches de Nueva Italia in October. Prosecutors suspect the team is being financed by a drug gang for money laundering purposes.